Michigan

Extra-base hits power Tigers over Rangers

AP PhotoDetroit's Ramon Santiago hits a two-run home run to right field off of Texas starter Vicente Padilla in the third inning Tuesday.

DETROIT -- For one night, at least, the Detroit Tigers were who everybody thought they were and then made a surprising lineup change to try to stay that way.

It mattered not a bit that starting pitcher Justin Verlander gave up a solo home run in the second inning.

The Tigers' heavily publicized but slow-in-coming-around hit parade responded with the repetitive force of extra-base hits to produce a 10-2 victory over the Texas Rangers on Tuesday night at Comerica Park.

And they did it with three of their best hitters -- Gary Sheffield, Placido Polanco and Curtis Granderson -- missing from the lineup while rehabilitating injuries.

TRACKING THE TIGERS

• Tuesday's game: The Tigers finally flexed their underused hitting muscles in the 10-2 victory over Texas for a second straight win for only the second time this season. Even Ramon Santiago got into the act by breaking a streak of 417 homerless at-bats with his first homer since 2003, the year he snapped a skid of 321 plate appearances without a homer. Santiago sent a 1-0 Vincente Padilla pitch over the right field fence. "It was down the middle, I got a good swing and the ball just carried," Santiago said. To which manager Jim Leyland said, "I hope he doesn't start hitting the ball in the air now because that will be the kiss of death for him. If you hit it in the air that far, it's OK, but if you don't, it's not good."

• Record: 8-13

• Verlander no longer vexed: Tigers right-hander Justin Verlander hardly looked like one of the most feared pitchers in the majors while starting off with a 0-3 record and 7.03 ERA. He allowed one run on six hits in six innings to pick up his first win of the year. Here's how he did it: "My arm slot was a little low, and I changed that a hair especially with my breaking ball," Verlander said. "I thought my movement was a little sweeping and too side-to-side. I wanted to get back to up-and-down."

The number of hits, 11, wasn't overly impressive, but the ratio of those that weren't singles -- there were four doubles, three home runs and a triple -- was. And, so was the five-run fifth inning that lifted Verlander to his first victory.

"We showed some signs other times and then went back into a little funk so I'm not going to put the cart before the horse here just yet," manager Jim Leyland said before making what he called a "major announcement."

Carlos Guillen, who played shortstop in his four previous seasons with Detroit, is moving from first base to third base for tonight's game against Texas while Miguel Cabrera is switching from third to first.

"The reason is, we think at this particular time, it gives us a better team," Leyland said without taking reporters' questions on the subject or further elaboration. "That's the logic behind it."

Leyland told Guillen and Cabrera before the game.

Guillen, who last played third with Seattle in 2003, wasn't dismayed by getting another change of scenery.

"It's fine for me and it's good for this team," he said. "How is it different? It's the other side of the diamond. I'm not going to put pressure on myself. I'm going to try to do the best I can.

"We got the big inning for Verlander and he pitched great," Cabrera said. "We got better, and hopefully we'll play better offensively from now on and score a lot more runs."

The Tigers wiped out the one-run deficit in the bottom of the second inning with RBI doubles by Edgar Renteria and seldom-used Ramon Santiago, who played second base in place of Polanco.

Detroit blew off some pent-up frustration in the third when Magglio Ordonez got things started with a solo home run that also provided him with the 1,000th RBI of his career. Cabrera followed that with a homer and Jacque Jones tripled.

Renteria singled in Jones and the light-hitting Santiago even got into the act with a two-run homer -- his first home run in five years.

Verlander, the acknowledged ace of the staff, allowed six hits and had three strikeouts in six innings while improving to 1-3.

"It feels nice to get off the schnide," he said. "I think everybody stepped up and did their part. It was a great example of team baseball."

Even Detroit much-maligned bullpen came through by allowing one run on two hits in the final three innings.

Nevertheless, Leyland wasn't ready to pronounce the 8-13 Tigers cured of whatever has been ailing his team. Getting Granderson, Sheffield and Polanco back into the mix can't hurt.

"All along I've felt we were capable but we've got to get it going on a consistent basis before we can say we're over the hump," he said. "We've had a lot of different things happen to us haven't really been able to get in sync.

"We've had some movement and changes and different things. We're trying to get in sync the way we want to do it."